Producteev Gets a Massive Upgrade: Android App, Windows Desktop App, and an All Around Makeover

This is a post by Bobby Travis, who wrote with me at 40Tech from 2009 through 2012. Bobby has since moved on to bigger and better things, but I've left all of his great contributions up on the site. - Evan

Producteev, one of our favourite — and one of the best — to-do apps, has released a massive upgrade that includes some long-awaited features and platform updates. The web and iPhone apps have gotten a makeover, the much clamoured-for Android app has finally arrived, and there is now a Windows 7 desktop app to balance out the Mac version. Even the logo has been updated (bye bye Tasky the beaver)!

To top it all off, Producteev has added a few new features into the mix — and yes (drumroll), that does include sub-tasks…

Check out the video below for the overview of some of the new functionality in the multi-platform task manager.

There have been usability and visual enhancements across all apps, improvements to some of the main Producteev feature-set (discussed in previous posts), and some brand new features such as integration with TaskRabbit (a service for crowdsourcing small tasks), the ability to print tasks and export them to CSV, as well as the aforementioned sub-tasks.

Now, I know many of you have been waiting patiently for sub-tasks, but don’t get too excited. At this time, sub-tasks are really nothing more than a checkable list added to the top of the main task’s detailed view. There is no way to interact with them outside of that view, or to add specific dates, labels, or anything else. Also, they don’t appear to work in the mobile apps yet, either. Hopefully, there will be improvements, and soon, especially in the case of the missing mobile integration.

The Android app is great. I can now use Producteev with my wife’s phone just as easily as my own, and with an interface that’s nearly identical to the iPhone’s. As Producteev mentions in this post, however, Android users should be aware that the new app is in beta. Don’t expect an error-free experience, just yet.

As always, Producteev is free to use for workspaces that have one or two people. If you want to collaborate with larger teams, unlimited people and storage space can be had for $20 USD per month (it gets cheaper the more workspaces you buy).

Update: Google Calendar integration has been temporarily disabled due to stability issues. It should be back up and running within the week — and it will be better than before. Two way task-sync with Gcal, folks!

Bobby isn't 40-something, but is a strong supporter of the Grown-up Geek kind. He's a loving husband and father first, but is also a freelance writer, productivity nut, operatically trained singer, and (not-so) closet geek.
Check out his random thoughts, wackiness, and Instagram pics on Tumblr, Twitter, or Google+-- or just head over to bobby-travis.com.

Sean says:

I’ve been using Toodledo. It’s nice but kind of tiresome. I’m going to evaluate Producteev (looks good so far). Free version seems to have more features than free Toodledo.
Q: Do you know how to get tasks out of Toodledo into Producteev?
Thx

Unfortunately, I do not. There are a lot of ways to get tasks into Producteev, but importing from another system isn’t up on the list.

I’m not that familiar with Toodledo — interface drove me nuts. Evan might have more insight here, but if there is a way for you to get your tasks to your email account, you could then forward the email into Producteev via email to task.

Nina says:

I guess I finally have to upgrade to iOS 5 and check out Producteev again. I gave it a try a while ago but decided it wasn’t quite right for me; I love the new interface and I’m curious as to how the new version compares.

BTW, Bobby, I think you and Dan appear in the 3rd screen shot of new Producteev on the app store (“Task Details”)?

Let me know how it works out, Nina! And yeah, there are several pics in the Producteev demos that include me, Dan, and other vocal Producteev users. They asked us a while back — it was a sort of thank you. :)

Nina says:

I tried it (loving iOS 5 so far!) and Producteev’s new UI is indeed lovely BUT it seems the update removed the option to connect workspaces with GCal. I hadn’t done it before and looked in every possible menu in the web app to do it now, but could only find email and messenger options, nothing for GCal or Google Tasks. That would have been the one feature to tempt me away from Awesome Note, to which I recently returned, thanks to Evernote’s rich text editing issues on iOS (since a lot of my recurring tasks include updating text files, I moved them to one of the AN folders, so now I can edit them either on the web or, if I’m on the road, on my phone without the formatting coming undone).

Perhaps I’m missing something? I think the GCal option used to be in the workspace admin menu but now I can’t see it anymore.

I looked around, and I discovered the same thing. Not sure why that would be, as the literature on their site still says Google Calendar integration, as does every recent post about Producteev I can find. I did see that they have a calendar view in the web app now, but I can’t see that they would remove one of their main selling features. What’s more, I can’t find a way in the new Windows app to do any sort of Workspace connectivity configurations. You still need the web app for that, apparently.

The Gcal thing could be an error, I suppose. I may have to contact them to find out.

Eileen says:

I read somewhere that it has been disabled temporarily for some reason.. on the blog I think I read it. Couldn’t believe my eyes!!! Working on enabling again. Ismael is the chap dealing with it I think.

I just switched from Asana to Producteev for web-task management and love it. The one thing missed here is that sub-tasks are also not available in the native Mac and PC apps, which is frustrating.

Having looked at a handful of product management apps, I have to say, there is still nothing that compares to tasks in Microsoft Outlook. Now, I’ve switched to Mac and don’t use Outlook anymore (Outlook for Mac sucks) and so I’ve been forced to find another solution but I am still left wanting.

What I miss the most is reading an email and being able to create a task from that email with one click, making the subject of the email the title of the task and the email content as the “notes” field in the task (you could create calendar events in the same way, which I miss just as much). I am waiting for both Google and Apple to integrate mail, calendar, and tasks in the same way. I hope I won’t be waiting too long.

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